Damn, there are a lot of these.

Most of these aren't that good, but they certainly reveal a lot about where I was mentally after the accident.

* * *

Oh the games

Khayyam wrote that destiny plays with us like chessmen,

Laying us back in the closet as we are slain,

But no voice warned, "Check" as the car fell off the lift

On Kelly's chest, or before Darryl's aorta burst.

I think the universe plays with us like pick-up-sticks.

One moment your friend is resting near you,

And the next a hand has plucked him from sight without so much as a stir.

A year ago, the hand had me.

But the people whom I touch shivered, and it had to put me back.

* * *

Sometimes I lay down on the garage floor of the universe

And smack my head against the concrete

To convince myself the pain is all in my body.

But myself ached like this before the accident,

And I want to speak to the manager.

This is not the life I ordered.

* * *

Cosmic Mix-up

There must be some mistake.

Somewhere a man who doesn't deserve it

Is walking around on my leg while I make do with this,

which isn't even a proper stump--all wrinkly and asymmetrical.

While he kisses my man,

Gets paid for doing my job poorly,

And dances in the halls or Khartoum or La Paz with my body,

I sit in my bed and whimper.

I only hope, that when the meteorite with my name on it strikes the Earth,

The mistake holds.

* * *

Not Strictly Necessary

I wonder what makes this guy different

From all the undeserving with whom I've never bothered,

And from the pretty/useless whom I later regret.

He's smarter than I am, of course,

But that doesn't explain my reaction.

For to misstep and lose him would please me;

It's not every day I meet a man whom I don't deserve.

* * *

Chivalry is Dead

No Launcelot am I,

No unstoppable flood of testosterone.

Nor am I Galahad,

Impeccably chaste and iron-willed.

No, I'm Gawain, who tags along

As Skipper follows Barbie,

And tells the other knights how swell they are.

Right before he died, Arthur saw a vision of Gawain,

Surrounded by an aura of girls

as gay men always are,

And was warned not to fight lest he die.

Men never listen.

* * *

Re: turn

I think this year I shall resolve

To rest my legs like ancient roots

And photosynthesize my food.

In short, I shall become a tree,

To settle, naked, in the wood,

And cease to talk, to love, to move.

I'll let the moss grow up my stump,

And vines will bear fruit on my head.

Lovers will picnic in my shade

And never even notice me

As I look down on them.

* * *

Re: solution

Every year I lay a sheet of starchy vellum

Over the passing one I've ruined

With doodles in the margins

And wrinkled circles where tears fell,

I mistake the new one for a clean slate,

Pretending that the places where the quill rested

Leaving a pool of ink don't show through,

But even if they didn't I would remember.

Still, I slowly turn the page over

And think of all I plan to choose differently.

Of shallow love I will choose not to have,

And terrifying reality I shall choose to face.

And as I lay it over the top, I dogear the corner.

Perfect is boring.

* * *

Things My Grandmother Criticized Today

* Angela Ghiorgiu's bosom,

Which should not have been hanging out suggestively.

* The chocolate cake my mother sent her,

Which my Grandmother said, as she shoveled Taco Bell into her maw,

Showed little regard for her cholesterol.

* My singing, which, according to her spinet, was flat.

* And my English. Evidently saying 'Ayther' instead of 'Eether'

Makes me sound too German.

Some people love with touch, gifts, time.

Grandmother's love comes in streams of withering suggestions.

* * *

Re: flection

I bet you think I'm giving you the look--

Chewing you with my eyes--

Because I want to get into your pants,

But no.

I want to shuffle my feet on the carpet

And touch you with a spark.

I want to get into your skin,

And then we'll see if the treasure of my love

Is in your future.

* * *

Extended Care Facility

I'm not sure who's more oblivious,

Or whom we spend more energy conciliating:

My Grandfather, meticulously fingering the sheets

And trying urgently to tell us,

"The mmmyeah, the thing like the mmyeah!"

Or his wife, who insists that she doen't need her hearing aids,

And why on earth would she need a cup of coughing?

But I arrived at the nursing home at Nine this morning,

And she had been there since eight,

Spooning with him in the mechanical bed.

I realized that, all those hours I spend pretending to follow

Their mutually derailed bumper cars of thought,

I am being humoured.

* * *

Feeling Sorry for myself.

Those shoes Erik got for Christmas

Are way cool,

And they would never fit on my prosthesis.

Do you think,

If in this life I am very good,

In the next I will get two feet?

* * *

Happy Birthday!

My Stump is six months old today.

I thought it might be older before starting to speak,

But my family have always been quick learners.

It's first words weren't very impressive,

Just "Ouch," and "Dada,"

But today it made the sage observation,

"You're just using me as an excuse."

Out of the mouths of babes .


* * *

I hope this is the last poem on this topic

I showed him my scars--

The smooth one that looks like a noodle

The happy one that looks like it's winking

The ugly one

With the bone almost poking through

That looks like a whole raw chicken breast

And the one on the end

That looks like a snowflake.

I showed you my fucking stump, Jason,

And let you use me for a dumpster.

Now we're friends?

Any of my friends, if they knew,

Would smack you in your beautiful.

* * *

This last one is for those of you who were wondering how the thing in my last posts turned out.